The problem with coyotes and any other wild critter is that so long as there is some form of food available, their population will expand and as the pups are weened and they are forced out of the pack on their own, they will expand the territorial area they live in. With deer, the population will expand during the summer and then with winter and snow pack covering their grazing, the smaller and less experienced animals will basically starve to death with the number of deaths proportional to the severity of the winter and extent to which their grazing is inhibited. The less animals hunted during the season, the more will then die off by starvation in the winter. Of course the DNR and thus local governments dont earn a penny from the winter die off.
Coyotes benefit dramatically from the massive increase in road kill in winter, any wounded animals from hunters which they are unable to track down, not to mention buck that get injured in dominance battles. But ultimately expansion of their population means harder and harder competition for food which finally leads to migration of some of the animals into suburban area where there is no predation and no lack of 4 legged critters (cats, dogs etc) to feed on. When repeated exposure to suburban people show the coyotes that there is no danger, they loose their fear of humans and become quite dangerous as the increasing attacks on people and children continues. The primary reason for this is the ban on firearm discharge and people either not carrying to begin with or being reluctant to have to defend their actions in front of a DA who wants to make an example of them. California and more recently Colorado being prime examples of this sort of persecution of self defense actions, whether against criminal elements or critters. Just as murder rates continue to rise in the country's metro areas, one can expect to see a similar thing happening with any of the larger predators, whether it be coyotes, wolves, bear or cougar, given the fact that none of the animals associate danger with the human species in these locations.
